Even though the vast majority of Christians are as willing as the general population to make use of every available medical treatment when they have a physical malady, it seems that some Christians are unwilling to accept that mental health problems are as real as physical health problems.
In a study of Christian church members who approached their church for help with a personal or family member's diagnosed mental illness, researchers found that more than 32 percent were told by their pastor that they or their loved one did not really have a mental illness.The problem was solely spiritual in nature, they were told.
Here's the thing: Other studies have found that clergy, and not psychologists or other mental health experts, are the most common source of help sought in times of psychological distress.
"The results are troubling because it suggests individuals in the local church are either denying or dismissing a somewhat high percentage of mental health diagnosis," said study leader Matthew Stanford, professor of psychology and neuroscience at Baylor University in Texas. "Those whose mental illness is dismissed by clergy are not only being told they don't have a mental illness, they are also being told they need to stop taking their medication. That can be a very dangerous thing."
Being a Christian, I think I can identify the two obstacles that hinder Christians from properly understanding mental illness.
First, it may appear that acknowledging the reality of a mental illness undermines the Christian doctrine of sin. If sin is caused by illness, then how can God hold anyone accountable for anything? Yes, it's a slippery slope from (A) "that person has schizophrenia and is not responsible for his actions" to (B) "that person is a victim of society's injustice and is not responsible for his actions". But the fact that there's a risk of a slippery slope to (B) doesn't negate the truth behind (A).
Just as God will not condemn a person for missing church the day after they're injured in a car wreck or have a baby, God will not condemn a person for sins of omission or commission that are out of their control due to mental illness or disability. God's standard for each of us is that we honor him according to how he has enabled us.
Read the parable of the talents ("talents" are units of gold). The man who invested two talents and earned two more got the same reward as the man who invested five talents and earned five more. The man who had one talent wasn't condemned because he earned too little, but because he failed to use the talent he had at all. God doesn't expect more from us than he enables us to do. In the parable, God gave each man the talents he had, and God wasn't disappointed when the man to whom he gave two talents "only" earned two more.
I hope the connection I'm making is clear between the talents in the parable and the level of physical and mental health that God blesses a person with. The point is that mental illness or disability do not negate a person's responsibility to repent of their sin and accept Christ's payment to the degree they are able to do so, but that degree may be less than what a person in full health is capable of.
Second, while secular humanists are too extreme in their belief that man is purely material and mechanical, Christians have a tendency to view man as purely spiritual. It's true that men have spirits that stand outside the bounds of the natural physical world. For now, though, these spirits are bound to our physical bodies and must suffer the limitations of our mortal lives.
When Jesus was tortured and crucified he didn't dismiss the pain as merely a physical irritation that his spirit could ignore. No, he cried out in agony! And not just physical agony, but mental agony as well.
Matthew 27:46: About the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?"—which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
Has there ever been a deeper pain than that Jesus suffered when God turned his back on him for the sake of our sin? Not even the nails in his hands and feet compared to it. Jesus is God, but when he bound himself to a mortal body he experienced all the pain and suffering that goes along with the human experience -- physical and mental.
Christians who believe that mental illnesses or disabilities are merely matters of the will that can be overcome by the strength of our spirits have a fundamental misunderstanding of our dual nature. Our spirits and our bodies are not independent (as the Buddhists teach) but are intimately linked until they are finally separated at death. Some mental illness is the result of physical problems in physical brains, and can be no more overcome by willpower or therapy than can be diabetes.
When therapy is the best possible treatment for a mental illness, then I've got no doubt that such therapy should be Biblical in nature, but it should also be informed by medical expertise. When drugs are required to treat a physical problem in the brain, then they should not be rejected any more than a diabetic would reject insulin.
It's unnerving to accept that physical changes in our brains can affect our mental processes, but they can. Does this undermine the concept of free will? No, but it qualifies our free will. A man with a broken leg may want to run a marathon, but his failure to do so isn't the result of a lack of willpower. His free will may desire to, but his body simply cannot. A man with schizophrenia, or mania, or depression may want to act normally, but his brain will not cooperate.
Therapy is an important part of treatment for these diseases, but therapy alone will often not mitigate their symptoms enough to allow the normal exercise of free will. A man with diabetes receives therapy and instruction on how to manage his disease, what he should eat, and what sorts of activities he needs to limit, but even with the best therapy and willpower a diabetic may require insulin injections. A man with depression may require drugs to enable his body/brain to act on the instructions he is given in therapy and that his free will wants to carry out.
As with many issues, consideration of mental health issues requires a great deal of discernment on the part of Christians. It's true that many people are simply looking for ways to escape responsibility for their decisions and are quick to claim that some force outside of their control compelled them to act badly. Sometimes that's true and sometimes it's not, but Christians who dismiss all such claims will end up ignoring some of the most hurting people in the world who are in desperate need of God's love.
In Heaven there will be no mental illness just as there is no physical illness. As Christians we live with an expectation for that future, but we haven't reached it yet. Christians need to properly understand the nature of mental illness and mental disability if we hope to share God's love with people who are suffering.
I would imagine that Christians avoid mental health services because they expect those services to pressure them to accept a worldview with which they disagree. You're probably thinking about mental health treatment in terms of drugs, and within that realm I agree with you. But the world of talking cures is very unscientific, and laden with values questions.
> mental health services because they expect
> those services to pressure them to accept a
> worldview with which they disagree
Um, no. I think both Ben and Michael have interesting, but inaccurate insights because neither of you have used mental health professionals.
I have, and I will tell you that there is no "worldview" that is presented, and that with a well trained professional, counseling services in themselves are are not opposed to Christianity or any other religion.
Most people I find are totally ignorant of this field, taking their views from second hand sources or from perceived positions ("Freud was an avowed athiest, therfore his profession must also be", etc.). But until you actually experience it, or practice it, I think I will simply say you don't know what you are talking about. Sort of like commenting on riding a bike while you yourself don't know how to ride one.
> When therapy is the best possible treatment
> for a mental illness, then I've got no doubt
> that such therapy should be Biblical in nature
That is up to the patient, not the therapist. The patient decides which direction the therapy will go, and what it will take to reach "wellness". If that is Biblical, then the therpist doesn't get in the way. The therapist really represents an expansion of the mind and does not provide their own opinon or input - he/she accepts without question what and where the patient wishes to go.
If the patient is not Biblcal, then the reverse is also true: taking the patient there won't bring mental well being.
I base my observations on what I observed in Counseling Psychology graduate school, and what I've read and heard from practicing therapists.
You're right that a therapist's values shouldn't affect therapy, in theory. But we live in an imperfect world. Psychiatrists and psychologists are people like any other. Some are wise, insightful, and impartial, but most are not. I'm sure that nearly all of them want the best for their clients, but they can only define 'the best' according to their own belief system. It's a lot like journalists: They usually don't intend to distort the news; they just report on events as they perceive them, and their beliefs and preconceptions unavoidably distort their perceptions.
All of us have finite perception. None of us can see the world as it truly is. The trouble with therapists, in my experience, is that many of them don't understand that problem. They mistake their perceptions for reality, and then believe that their clients have nothing to worry about in terms of a mismatch between client and therapist worldviews.
Actually, one of my minor fields for my PhD was in psychology, and many of my grad school friends were psychologists of various flavors. I've also been in therapy! I'm not a credentialed expert, but I know whereof I speak.
So both of you have some background, but neither provide a solid argument why a "Christian" focus is better. In Ben's case I guess he is saying that since counselors are human and imperfect, then counseling is also imperfect, and therefore invalid.
For me the simple question is: does it work? For me, the answer was yes. If you look at statistics, counseling works for 2/3 of people, so better than chance.
If you expand it and ask if Biblical counseling is better, my guess is that there is not enough controlled data to say one way or the other (there are studies of different therapies, but nusually CBT vs. psychotherapy, etc.). If you look at counseling in non-Christian countries (say, Japan), my guess is that the statistics stay pretty constant.
DM: I don't think MW's saying anything like what you think he is. Ben maybe is a little bit dismissive of therapy, but mostly simply voices a fear which christians might reasonably have about counselling from a secular source.
It probably worthwhile for priests to get training to recognise mental disorder problems, since lots of christians will likely talk to their priest before talking to their GP with this kind of thing.
My limited experience of this kind of thing makes me believe that drugs are prescribed too readily and counselling/analysis actually discouraged -- of course, it's much more expensive. Drugs are really good once you know what you need to treat, but they're a bit of a blunt instrument to just throw at a patient to see what sticks. Analysis should be at least used for diagnosis, and probably used for most of the treatment too in a lot of cases.
DM wrote: "For me the simple question is: does it work? For me, the answer was yes. If you look at statistics, counseling works for 2/3 of people, so better than chance."
But "better than chance" doesn't mean better than 50/50, it means better than whatever the outcome would have been without counseling. Maybe 2/3 of people would recover without counseling? Do you know?
But anyway, I'm not even saying that therapy isn't useful! I'm just saying that many therapists are extreme secular humanists whose practice is inevitably influenced in that direction. Unfortunately, many Christian therapists distrust medicine and the objective data of psychology. So there's a disconnect.
I would like to commend the writer of this article for being truthful and accurate!! I have experienced this attitude from good Christian people and disagreed with them.My family member was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder. The symptoms were very severe, and I sought help from the experts who kept everything under control.I used counselors of the world that were helpful.I have also seen those who were out of their mind.I let doctors medicate her, and there was little understanding from the Christian world for what I did.I felt that it was more than" spiritual in nature."She got saved, but she was still tormented!Seven months ago,she was diagnosed with a blockage to her kidney! She had many kidney stones to pass for two months. She woke up from surgery, symptom free!!!
Thank you for an amazing article. My family member was able to get off of most of the medication that she was on. She is now in college!
She is a great Christian who does not hesitate to tell people about what God has done in her life!
Her illness put her in the place where she could witness to people about God's grace.Christians often say that the medicine makes them "doped up."
This is not so. It is the illness that makes them stare because their minds are clouded. They can not think like that.The medicine often just calms them. Many of the mentally ill have been traumatized. They need the love and care of Christians who need to understand, " With all they getting, get understanding."